


Go Ahead Rip My Heart out (Show Me What Love's All About)

by PseftisIncertus



Category: IT (Movies - Muschietti), IT - Stephen King
Genre: 5+1 Things, But mostly angst, Fluff and Angst, I need an outlet for my feelings for Reddie, M/M, Richie Tozier-centric, no beta we die like men
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-06
Updated: 2019-12-06
Packaged: 2021-02-25 03:47:47
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,381
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21570307
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PseftisIncertus/pseuds/PseftisIncertus
Summary: First love is such a beautiful thing, so innocent and pure. But Richie thinks, when the butterflies placed by that boy in his stomach are stuck fluttering in his throat, who will do the saving?Or alternatively,5 times Richie tries to remember why he has a scar on his palm and the name of a boy he knew very well and the 1 time he doesn't want to remember.
Relationships: Eddie Kaspbrak/Richie Tozier
Kudos: 37





	Go Ahead Rip My Heart out (Show Me What Love's All About)

**Author's Note:**

> The title was taken from a tumblr post, weheartit.com
> 
> I haven't read the book or watched the mini series, all the information I used are from the movies, wikia and my own head canons. 
> 
> Enjoy.

It started with a scar and a boy whose name he can't remember . . . 

The long angry lash ran across his palm, a promise carved in his very skin. He doesn't know where he got it, he had it ever since he could remember. All of his childhood lost and he was ready to believe he have sprouted from the ground as a 14 year old boy. But as the scar on his hand becomes visible and a resounding name of a town in Maine pops in his head, he knew he had a childhood and he knew he spent that childhood in-love with a boy.

Sometimes the scar and the boy would entangle with different memories and would present itself as a laughing and violent clown. Sometimes its a stutter, a kippah or curly red locks. Most of the time, its a remainder of a hole his trying to fill.


**1**

The scar and the boy reminds Richie of pillow forts.

Cushions piled on top of one another to resemble a fortress. He recalls a certain night of his childhood where he sneaked out from home and went to the boy's house. He would knock on the window and the boy would open up for him.

"I felt like we were meant to be together. I mean, look how fate just kept throwing us at each other!", Richie greets him with a joke.

"It's midnight and you are on my window. How did you get here?", the boy questions him, but the smile on his lips betrays the emotion he is trying to show.

"Fate, weren't you listening?", Richie climbs onto the window and sees a pillow fort made. He laughs at the childish display, the boy raises his eyebrows, challenges Richie if he would rather stay out. 

"Move over", the Trashmouth would say and they would spend the night bantering and telling jokes.

His mind has forgotten what it was they talked about that night but his body remembers the soft touches they shared. It was the one thing he never forgot. Not ever, not once, not really. The way their fingers hesitantly brush one another, the heat of the boy's breath on his shoulders and the delicate way the boy curls into him. They were best friends, no doubt, but there was pining, there was something else in the way their skin touches that tells Richie, maybe they could be something more. That someday he wouldn't have to be satisfied with the scrapes of bodily contact. That one day he would know what it feels for those lips to sear into his own. That one day he wouldn't have to hide.


**2**

The scar and the boy reminds Richie of milkshakes.

Those that have generous helpings of whipped cream and syrup. The ones large enough for two. Richie remembers that summer, they were in a diner with their friends. They all sat in a booth, they squeezed their small bodies despite the hot weather, sweat falling from their foreheads. Richie should think it gross and yet the boy looks nothing but majestic even though he has been running his mouth about this so called "Lyme disease" that are more prominent in the summer seasons. As they wait for their order to arrive, they talk of their summer holiday plans. They talk as if it was the only thing left to do, as if one silent moment would dispel the feeling that right now, in that very moment, they were happy.

When their order finally arrives, Richie calls out for the boy and takes the two straws in his milkshake, he was meant to share with someone, and tried impressing him by how fast he can finish the drink. It was no surprise that he ended up having a brain freeze but all of them were laughing. All of them were in such high spirits they were in their very own bubble. Outside of the diner, the world could have stopped spinning and it wouldn't have mattered because right now, they were together.

Richie knew that there were tiny pieces of these people he carries with him, that a single thought about them would explode like acid that would burn the world down. Just a memory, a joke or an afterthought and the floodgates would burst and all he would remember would be love. Love for the people he would soon forget, love for the boy to whom his eyes averts to, in case he relays a secret message, in case the pretense of being just friends was revealed. The longing for more given away. The boy returns the gaze with equal intensity, a question hanging in his lips but Richie retreats to that safe side of friendship. He shy's away and hides his vulnerabilities, he knew deep down there is no room in his body for anything but the boy. His arms desire him, his ears adore him and his knees shake with blind affection. It wasn't a question or fear of falling in love, it was just a matter of time. So when they parted ways that summer afternoon, Richie did not say he likes him like he wanted to, instead he kept it to goodbye because he knew love would mean some falling and he was afraid of heights.


**3**

The scar and the boy reminds Richie of Prom.

Teenagers dancing in an old gym, ribbons and streamers adorning the make-shift dance floor. Dim lights reflecting faces of young lovers enjoying moments of bliss. Richie didn't have that, he was sure he had a dance partner though but he thinks he lost her along the way. Instead, what Richie has was a stick of cigarette and an intense longing for a certain asthmatic hypochondriac. He fills his chest with the smoke and releases it, as the smoke dissipates in the cold, chilly air, Richie sees someone approaching him. A short boy with grayish blue eyes, he knew that features from anywhere. He would be in a crowd of people and the boy would stand out like no other. He stopped meters away from him, arms folded and a frown on his lips. 

"Don't think I would step an inch closer until you put that out", he says. Richie can't help but smile at that, he obeys and the boy tells him all the bad effects of smoking like it some sort of memorized mantra. Richie took a moment to look at the boy. They were in the hallway, the dim lights from the gym escapes a tiny window and reflects on him. His eyes shines bright and his navy blue suit complements his skin color. Richie can almost imagine how he would look if they were in the dance floor, his hands on his waist and swaying to the music. Suddenly, his heart start to beat faster, in that empty corridor, with the faint sounds of music and lingering smell of cigarettes. He was forced to admit to himself what he's known since the 1st moment he laid his eyes on this boy, it wasn't love at first sight mind you, it was more of familiarity. Like, oh look! its him, its going to be him. Richie wasn't so ready to fall in love until he saw the boy walking towards him, suit and tie matching his perfect delicate features, hands gesturing and emphasizing the importance of health. He keeps on going on about the dangers of cigarettes and the Trashmouth's heart melts naturally, what a view, he didn't know love could be such a view.

"Didn't see you dancing there?", he says, trying to mask the sound of concern. Richie scoffs, tells him some lame excuse. The boy interprets it as him not knowing how to dance and they proceeded to argue on how good Richie can dance and how the boy thinks he can't and is way better than him.

"If you're so good in dancing why don't we dance huh? Lemme see how good you say you are." the Trashmouth challenges, and he had to be careful, so careful that his dare wouldn't show its real intention. He admits he has fallen in-love but he wasn't so sure the boy would reciprocate. Right now he just wanted to be in his arms, to live in an illusion that his acceptance of the challenge has a layer of permission for contact.

They find an empty room and the boy locks the door. Richie asks why he needs to lock it and the boy counters with why would he not? A heavy silence follows and Richie remembers a certain clown taunting him.

_Don’t touch the other boys Richie or they’ll know your secret_

"Hey!" the boy brings him back to reality. He tries to focus on the moment. Their nervous hands trying to position themselves, they fidget and tries not to give too much attention in what they are trying to do. Slowly, as they got their rhythm Richie tries to lead and the boy refuses, they start to banter as any of them did not want to assume the girl's position. They end up having both hands on each other's shoulders until it was silly enough the nervous energy died completely. They came back to the rhythm they have established and slowly their movements went along with the faint song playing on the hallway.

_Some people are made for each other  
Some people are made for another for life, how 'bout us  
Some people can hold it together  
Last through all kinds of weather, tell me can we?_


**4**

The scar and the boy reminds Richie of the color blue.

Blue that represents the sky and the sea, open spaces, loyalty and trust. It was the color of the unmade bed on the boy's house, the color of his inhaler's cap and the color Richie says his favorite. To be honest he didn't have a favorite color, it wasn't until all of his friends were trying to guess it and the boy excitedly yelled out blue, that he knew it had to be blue. Now, the color is something else to him, it was in everything and it was in nothing all at the same time. 

Blue was the color he first sees as he wakes up on a bed that wasn't his, beside a body that feels so unfamiliar like he didn't have sex with it hours ago. He defines the body as a 'it' and not a she or a he, he think its easier because it feels as if he is betraying a memory of a boy with no name. Richie thinks, maybe he is a man now, going about his business like everyone else. He might be a professional, a doctor or a risk analyzer. He might also be married with a woman who is just like his mother or entirely different. Richie feels it so unfair he is taken hostage by his lost memories, he never seem to move forward. He thinks maybe its because its his first love. He then remembered a quote from Stephen Fry that said. 


" _First love is unrequited ultimately because it’s so huge. It’s such an act of giving and it requires so much back that it can never be given back. It’s like an atom bomb, it’s all the energy of who you are and who you want to be and what you love and what you hope to be explodes. It is impossible for a single human being to offer that back to you in a mutual way._ "


And First love is such a beautiful thing, so innocent and pure. But Richie thinks, when the butterflies placed by that boy in his stomach are stuck fluttering in his throat, who will do the saving?

The boy was never anything but a fluttering feeling, something that never really stopped. Something between a yes and a no. Sometimes the best, sometimes the worst thing in his life. He never goes completely and he never left Richie's mind. Other people come and go and he doesn't know what it is inside of him that will always go back to the boy. So as he picks up his shirt, and feel the stirring of the body beside him, he utters a silent apology to her and all the people who had made him hard but not weak enough to fall. He apologizes as the color blue stares right back at him because the truth is he loves the boy, and the truth is, he still does.


**5**

The scar and the boy reminds Richie of jigsaw puzzles.

Tiling puzzles that requires the assembly of often oddly shaped interlocking and mosaiced pieces. Each piece usually has a small part of a picture on it; when complete, they produce an image. Richie remembered a certain curly haired boy with a kippah carrying a box set. They spend the afternoon completing the puzzles, hanging out in their clubhouse. Richie remembers one of his friends, an overweight boy, pose the question: "Don't you guys think life is like a jigsaw puzzle?". He doesn't remember if they even had a discourse about the subject but he was sure they all laughed it off and Richie would have said a joke or a one-liner about nerds and the boy would release a constant barrage of "Shut up Richie" or "Beep Beep Richie". But as he grew older, he understood what his friend said.

Lives are like individual jigsaw puzzles. As people go through life, they're just slowly piecing it together, bit by bit, based on experiences and lessons that they’ve learned, until they get the best picture. But the thing is everyone has also lost the box for their jigsaw. So none of them know what the image they’re trying to make is, they're all just confidently guessing. So how do they finish the jigsaw when they don’t have the image to work off? They start from the outside, the sides and the four corners. Family, Friends, Hobbies and Job.

Richie has this four corner set and all he needed to work was towards the center. He had lived almost all his life chasing a memory of a boy he was confident enough was his missing, final piece. 

He decided then that he would have his first comedy special named 'Jigsaw". His manager asks him, 'Why Jigsaw? Why Richie 'Trashmouth' Tozier?', he said he remembers he was called Trashmouth because he talks loud and he always had a quip for everything, it was catchy enough for a comedian. He says it with longing he would be famous enough to be known, to be able to cry out to a boy, to trigger a memory of an old time, an old friend, an old love. That maybe in a better time, in a better world, in a better place he would find him sitting in the audience and recognition will dawn on him like finally sounding the word on the tip of one's tongue. And then Richie would smile and say the name he had spent so long remembering.


**+1**

Eddie

"Eddie Kaspbrak", Richie keeps on repeating. He says the name so tenderly, reverently and full of emotions, never wanting to forget even for a second. His manager started getting concerned, first his talent started vomiting when he was okay seconds ago, then he screwed up the first segment of his show and now he keeps on repeating someone's name.

"Richie, I need to know if you're alright? Who called on the phone?", the man says with all the authority he could muster.

"I need to go to Derry", Richie says, and even saying the name of the town makes him excited and scared shitless. Leave it to him to be able to pull that off. He settled schedules with his manager and took his car, speeding his way to get his things and booked his ticket to go to Maine.

Only when he rides the plane, did the deep premonition set in, his memories slowly piece themselves together. He remembers the Losers club, he remembers Georgie, he remembers It and all its taunting. He realize it never really left him, like salt in the sea, they became part of him, only this time, it wasn't just a feeling. It had a face, an image to a silhouette. Richie tries to calm himself and represses the tremble of his hands. He was conflicted, reprimanding himself for hurrying, hating himself for pretending to be brave. But then he remembers the boy, which reminded him of a great line from a 1989 classic, " _When you realize you want to spend the rest of your life with somebody, you want the rest of your life to start as soon as possible_ " and Richie feels like Harry, it was almost ridiculous. For a moment he forgot he was going to town to defeat an evil clown, for a moment he made himself believe that he was there to meet the boy-, no Eddie, he was there to meet Eddie. To make sense on how a small man, with made-up asthma and grayish blue eyes could have such a hold on him. 

Their first meeting did not disappoint, after Richie meets up with Beverly and Ben outside of the Chinese restaurant, they went in and saw the other three, Bill, Mike and Eddie. Richie strikes the gong and announces the Loser's club finally reuniting. He can't remove the smile plastered in his face. His friends, Eddie and his memories all fall in their righteous place, he felt as if all his life he had been half of a whole and in this moment, in this time, he was complete. He finally understood why Eddie's existence never really left him. They were a hybrid, Eddie-and-Richie, he can't understand how they have lived their lives apart when the seam which combines them is clearly there. As soon as they sat at the table, one word and they fell back in rhythm. Richie teases Eddie, and Eddie fights back, they went on an easy banter and he couldn't believe that 27 years have past. He thinks back then, when he had a small moment to reflect amidst the celebration and story telling, Richie would have endured nights of tear stained pillows if it meant he would have this, these moments of unadulterated happiness. He sees it now, as he chances a glimpse on the man on his side. Love isn't tumultuous and intense, it is gentle and passionate, its like coming home to an old town filled with friends and memories. This is Richie coming home to square face, droopy nose and grayish blue eyes.

"Wait, Eddie you got married?", Richie asks.

"Yeah, why is it so funny dickwad?", Eddie retorts.

And in a way, the conversation turned out into a mess, ending with another of Richie's mom jokes. He finally felt the gravity of the 27 years spent apart. That is the problem with love anyway, he thinks, you can love who you want but so can they. Of course, it would make sense that Eddie got married, doesn't matter if it is to a woman who is his mother's carbon copy. Richie couldn't find the heart to be mad or disappointed anymore. He has long surrendered himself anyway, he loves him, that is his truth. He loves him despite him, despite himself, despite the Devil clown who had a hand in this. And he knew, not long, his deep premonitions would come to life.

It started in the Chinese restaurant, then they found out about Stan's suicide. Derry reeks of death and it wouldn't take long until all of them would carry its smell. Richie didn't want to be brave, right now, he just wanted to be safe. All his childhood nightmares coming back to hunt him. The old lady who scared Beverly said " _Nobody who dies in here ever really dies_ "", but being six feet underground isn't something he really wants. Not when he is finally with Eddie, not when he finally found Eddie. So he tries to leave and convince the others too, but when he couldn't find a way out he decided, maybe it won't hurt to be brave one last time.

And Richie tried, tried to be as brave as he can. From the moment they entered the Well house in Neibolt street to the time they were face to face with the clown's real form. Richie was brave, as brave he can be but not like this, not when he is looking at Eddie, bleeding and life draining out of him. He hears him telling him a joke about fucking his mom but he couldn't care less. In that instant he prayed, tried to look up and wishes, for the first time in his whole life, that heaven was real and there was a God listening to him.

_I've never believed in you, and maybe it's too late to start now. I'm not praying for myself but for this man in my arms. If you want an exchange then take me instead. Beat me, hurt me, suck the life out of me but for the sake of anything good in this world, please don't take him away from me._

Richie pleaded, because in that moment, its all that he could do. He ripped the clown's arm in fury, crushed the monsters heart and ran back to Eddie wishing that maybe, maybe it could make a difference but all he got was a cold corpse staring back at him. No Eddie, just remains of a once beating heart.

As the insides of the caves start to collapse, so did Richie. He wishes now, that he wasn't brave. He wishes now, that he was cowardly enough to drag Eddie out of Derry and drive as far away as they could from that godforsaken town. Maybe if he was, he wouldn't have to know how it feels to hold a cold dead body in his arms, maybe if he was, then he wouldn't have to run away from stones falling on him, maybe if he was, he didn't have to run away to save himself and leave Eddie's body behind. 

Even as they all walk away from what just happened, jumping to the lake they once swam on as children, even if all of his friends tried to console him, Richie still blames himself for being brave. He feels the weight of his lost crushing him and he wishes it becomes real enough to choke the life out of him and maybe he would feel better or maybe he'd feel nothing at all. He'd pay anything to feel nothing at all. 

And as they finish what they came to do, they all went their separate ways. Richie went to Mike to ask him if everything will go back to normal, they'd lose their memory of the town and become this incomplete puzzle piece, his friend looks at him in pity and says he doesn't know and they will soon find out. The Trashmouth fakes a smile and heads out. He went to the kissing bridge he once carved his initials on.

**R+E**

He stares at it with longing, he stares at it with anger. All his life he only loved one man and he was taken away from him as soon as he got him again. How would he live his life now? How would he live knowing he is half of one whole? How would he live knowing there is a seam-turned-scar down his center that will remind him of his lost?

He thought by the end of everything, he and Eddie would sit down and talk about things, yet when all was said and done, there was only silence; persistent, haunting and close to his heart. A void that can never be filled, a puzzle piece that is gone and can never be replaced. He is once again confronted of what Eddie is to him. He loved him, more than he could ever love anything, even before he remembered his name. They belong to each other even before they belong to themselves, at least that is what he believed in. Now he had to live with the fact that he could never have the one thing in this world he would give up everything, including his life. He was more than a memory, he was more than a feeling, he was more than a best friend, he was more than half of Richie. He was all of him and with him it went. Now, he is just a shadow of his former self. 

There was nothing to be done but to move on, Richie notes that the scar on his hand is slowly fading, and with a deep pain on his heart he wishes maybe the memories would fade as well. He can rebuild himself, he has to, Eddie wouldn't like it if he didn't. So he rode back to his car and drove away. Bill said that the farther away from Derry you are, the more your memories will fade, Richie plans to live in the North Pole if that is the case. He steps on the accelerator, speeding up. Maybe if he goes faster, the memory will fade just as fast. He thinks back and checks . . . 

_Pillow forts, milkshake, prom, blue, jigsaw puzzles and Eddie . . . ._

No. He thinks he should try hard enough. He speeds up some more and thinks,

_Pillow forts, Milkshake, Prom, Blue, Jigsaw Puzzles And Eddie . . . ._

Fuck. He is not trying hard enough, he breathes in more and steps on the gas,

_PILLOW FORTS, MILKSHAKE, PROM, BLUE, JIGSAW PUZZLES AND . . . ._

Bright lights blinds Richie for a second and he swerves his car to prevent the collision. He hits a tree and his car tumbles down the hill. As soon as the rolling stops, he tried to get out of the car and he lies down on the grass. He can hear muffled sounds from above, people calling out if he was alright. He looks to the sky and tries to remember,

_Pillow forts, milkshake, prom, blue, jigsaw puzzles and . . . ._

He closes his eyes.

_Eddie_

He breathes in.

It ended with a scar and a man whose name he can't forget . . . . . .

**Author's Note:**

> Credits to: 
> 
> *Daniel Sloss for the wonderful jigsaw puzzle analogy, you guys should watch his comedy special, Jigsaw.  
> *The song used was "How 'bout us" by Champaign  
> *The 1989 classic was "When Harry met Sally"  
> *And finally, the hybrid and seam part was borrowed from the Johnlock fanfic classic 'Alone in the water'
> 
> So I hope you guys enjoyed(?) the fic. Kudos and Comments are always welcome.
> 
> Here's my [tumblr](https://www.tumblr.com/dashboard) if you guys wanna chat. :)


End file.
